Wednesday, December 14

Samsung Galaxy Y running on Android OS v2.3 aka Gingerbread can be titled as the one of the most affordable Android Smartphone in the market, by one of the leading handset manufacturer in the market - Samsung. Being the cheapest member of Samsung Galaxy Android Series is loaded with latest features too and has capability to compete with some mid range Android Smartphone too.

After using it for few day, I could not resist myself sharing my experience with the newly added member Samsung Galaxy Y. Basically meant for young generation, and that's what Y means here.Let's explore Samsung Galaxy Y -

Design – A simple candy bar, normally sized, measuring 104 x 58 x 11.5 mm weighing 97.5 g is a decent Android Smartphone with a 3 inch TFT capacitive touchscreen display along with one hard brushed button in the middle, where the two touch button to each side, at the bottom. Where the top front display comprises the Samsung logo, ear-piece and don't get confused with two sensors as a video calling camera. Power button to it's right and a volume button to the other. Bottom houses the mouth-piece, where the top is contained by 3.5mm headset jack and the micro USB 2.0 port. Unfortunately microSD card slot is located beneath the battery. The all plastic body is quite well packed and durable too. Beneath lies the 2 MP camera with no flash along with a loud speaker. Nothing more to say about the design, but to me design is perfect.

Camera – Don't expect a decent camera at this price range, the camera is only 2 MP(1600x1200 pixels), on top the low screen resolution add to it's woes. The camera is a fixed focus too, though laden with great in-built features like Smile shot, Panorama shot, Geo-tagging. But if you are looking for a camera as a key feature in your phone, then this is not your cup of tea. In my opinion, camera might have survived but it's the screen resolution which is accounting for the bad rating. Talking about video recording, Samsung Galaxy Y is capable of recording videos at QVGA@15fps.

Processor – It's the 832MHz processor which makes it a good buy at this price range as it scores over some other mid-ranged Android Smartphone too. Quite faster processing power, great phone for web browsing especially on the Android OS v2.3.5 and a better performance at multi-tasking too. Switching between applications and gaming is all fine. Though, great performance by the processor, but if and only if you can manage that all on a small 3 inch display. But still a great add-on at this decent price tag.

Connectivity – Another plus point according to me, a full fledged device in terms of connectivity features. GPRS, EDGE, 3G at HSDPA, with download rates of up to 7.2 Mbps. Wi-Fi which can be used as a Wi-Fi hot-spot too. Along with the latest version of Bluetooth v3.0 with A2DP, HS and a microUSB v2.0. And a standard 3.5mm audio headset jack to house up every standard headphones of your choice. 5 out of 5 in terms of connectivity features at this price tag.

Memory – 160 MB internal storage, 290 MB user available RAM is enough to carry on your tasks with a seamless flow. To carry over your personal files, media content 2 GB micro SD card is included in the package which can be further expanded to 32 GB.

Audio/Video Quality – The audio quality of the device is up to the mark considering the price range, much better than it's competitors in the same family. A better pair of headphones will beautify your music listening experience. Coming to the video quality, the video player itself is a pretty basic with a progress bar along with play/pause button and forward/rewind buttons, smartphone manage well enough to play 3GP and MP4 videos. In fact, it only supports 3GP and MP4 video playback. Good audio quality but video quality is another let down due to low screen resolution.

Power House – 1200mAh Li-ion standard battery is what you got to power it up, enough power to carry on the device to a day or two with the normal usage. Battery provides Stand-by time up to up to 850 h on 2G and 540 h on 3G. Talk-time obviously a bit lower than that, the specification says up to 17 h on 2G and up to 6 h 20 min on 3G. Pretty good battery backup to keep it going for a day or two.

What's In The Box(Package) -

Samsung Galaxy Y handset

Li-ion battery 1200mAh

User manual along with a Cd(Kies software)

Charger

microUSB cable

2 GB micro SD memory card

Screen Protector

Headset with microphone

Pros -

Android OS v2.3.5 Gingerbread.

832 MHz Powerful Processor.

Affordable Android Smartphone.

Good Connectivity Features.

Good Audio Quality.

Good Battery Backup.

Cons -

Low Screen Resolution.

Bad Camera Quality.

Lacks Secondary Camera.

Fix Focus.

No Flash Support.

Verdict – Considering the price tag, a good competitor to Samsung Galaxy Pop, Samsung Galaxy Fit and other Micro-Max or Dell based cheap Android Smartphone within the similar price range. Rather than going for them, I would recommend you to choose Samsung Galaxy Y S5360. A good device for the one who wants to enjoy a bite of Android Operating System, ahem, Android OS v2.3.5 aka Gingerbread. A good and branded device for the general audience. Not meant for a hardcore Android fans. If the basic camera and a bit of low screen resolution does not bother you, then this is the Smartphone especially made for you.

Saturday, November 26

Motorola DEFY plus, newly launched version of the previous Motorola DEFY is not a recommendable smartphone to settle with. Motorola DEFY Plus launched in September 2011 whereas the Motorola DEFY debuted last year in October 2010. The newer version is priced at 18000 INR whereas 14000 INR is what you have to spend to own a Motorola DEFY. The two devices vary greatly in price but if you take a closer look at the features and specifications they provide, are almost same or in other words one can say Motorola DEFY Plus is not worth the money. How? Read on.

Talking about the processors first, Motorola DEFY houses a 800MHz Cortex-A8 processor, TI OMAP3610 chipset whereas Motorola DEFY Plus is having 1 GHz TI OMAP 3620 processor. The difference between the two processor is that the TI OMAP 3610(what used in Motorola DEFY) is under-clocked version of same, what used in Motorola DEFY Plus. So there won’t be much difference between the performance of the two devices. However, you can overclocked Motorola DEFY to run at 1.5GHz. Try this at your own risk.

Both the Smartphone has 2GB internal memory, 2GB micro SD card included in the package box, where Motorola DEFY Plus has 512 MB RAM and 1 GB ROM and Motorola DEFY has only 512MB RAM. Both the devices can be expanded to 32GB via micro SD.

Coming to design and display, both the smartphone measures 59 x 107 x 13.4 mm, not change in the design, display measures 3.7 inches(~265 ppi pixel density), 480 x 854 pixels. No change at all. You can see the image, there's no difference when it comes to design.

Both the device sports a 5MP camera with LED Flash and auto-focus, 2592X1944 pixels. Motorola DEFY Plus can record videos at 30fps whereas Motorola DEFY users can enjoy VGA video recording quality. But that’s not a feature to appreciate in the device which is 4K more than the latter. Both the smartphone lacks front facing camera for video-calling.

Motorola DEFY Plus runs on Android OS v2.3 aka Gingerbread whereas the other one is having Android OS v2.2(Froyo). Geeky users can try Cyanogen Mod 7 which can run Android OSv2.3 on Motorola DEFY easily.

Connectivity features are same too, 3G with HSDPA, 7.2 Mbps, HSUPA, 2 Mbps, Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, DLNA, Wi-Fi hotspot, the only difference is that Motorola DEFY users can enjoy Wi-Fi hotspot when they are having a device running Android OS v2.2(Froyo), rest the Bluetooth and microUSB v2.0 are same.

Motorola DEFY is powered by 1540 mAh whereas Motorola DEFY Plus uses (1540+160)mAh = 1700 mAh battery to power up the device. Not much difference to appreciate with the price Motorola is selling the newer version.

There’s not much difference between the user-interface as the two smartphone are based on MOTOBLUR UI with Live Widgets.

Last but not the least, the price, Motorola DEFY is now available at 14,000INR approx whereas Motorola DEFY Plus requires more 4,000INR to buy.

If you are going for Motorola DEFY Plus, then I would better recommend either buying Motorola DEFY or Samsung Galaxy S LCD which costs 18,258 INR, a far better Android Smartphone than Motorola DEFY Plus. My opinion, Motorola DEFY Plus is not worth the money if you agree with reasons mentioned above.What do you think about this deal? Do share your opinion with us?

Tuesday, November 15

Bookmarking, just another way to save links to the web pages we might need in future.Why there`s a need to organize them?The web is full of useful stuff and tutorials, we might need in future, and I used to bookmark every other web page I visit, which means I have a huge collection of them resting in my arsenal, but when needed, how will you find the one which you are looking for without having to go through such a big list. That`s where it comes a need to organize them.

How Can You Do It?There are few small steps which can save a lot of time.Without The Use Of Any Tool, Web Browser Extension, Add-on?Using extensions or add-on, do make your web browser heavy, but with a little care users can organize bookmarks in a much better way. Here`s how to do it?

Organize bookmarks according to the category, suppose if you are looking for PHP Tutorials, then make a brand new folder(namely PHP Tutorials) in your bookmarking directory provided there in your web browser. Then bookmark all the useful web page links related to PHP Tutorials under that folder. This way you will not only find it easier to manage them, but you can access them instantly without having to follow any tantrums searching the huge list of bookmarks. Another example would be save all your web links related to social networking sites at one place in one folder. It`s one of the best way to organize bookmarks without using any extension or add-on.

Organize the bookmarks by some specific attribute(by name, by date or any other constraints). You can organize bookmarks alphabetically or by the date on which you bookmarked it.

Make use of the space provided by the new tab in Google Chrome, if you are not using too many app, then just drag and drop the bookmarked links to the big white space. That`s from where you can use them without having to digging deep inside your bookmark manager.

Use Google Chrome Sync feature to create a backup of your web browser preferences, so that in times of web browser crashes, you can access all your previous information instead of repenting about the loss. Mozilla Firefox users can also setup a Firefox Sync to save their web browser preferences, and same is the case with other web browsers, if in case, you are using one.

With The Use Of Tool, Web Browser Extension, Add-on?

There are loads of tools, Web Browser Extension, Add-on available out their on the web, but one which I recommend you to use are listed here(for Google Chrome Users). Mozilla Firefox users can try Xmarks Sync or Tagmarks .

If in case, you are switching from one web browser to another, then try Transmute, you can use this tool to automatically import/export all your bookmarks to the desired web browser.

So with the little management you can save lot of trouble and precious time. And you will find that it`s easy to search to the desired bookmarked web page/link. Do let us know if you are using any other strategies or tools to deal with bookmarking web pages.

Tuesday, November 8

With plethora of cloud services, cloud savvier`s can enjoy free online storage, but with free online storage, comes the real pain in managing the data we store and share with others over the cloud. What`s your bit, share your strategy to manage the data sprawled in number of cloud services you own? It`s a bit hard to maintain the data over cloud especially if you are using a couple of cloud storage services, but not now!As ZeroPC – a web based desktop in cloud, launched a new service, ZeroPC2.0 using which users can navigate, search, backup, control their data sprawled on cloud, and that too through a single place(single login).So lets explore what`s ZeroPC2.0 is made up of -

ZeroPC2.0 is a powerful universal search engine over the cloud – Searching data over cloud can`t be easier than this, just type some keywords or phrase related to file you are looking, and let the ZeroPC2.0 search all your cloud services to look for that file or document for you, without having to toil every single cloud storage account one by one. All connected services(Dropbox, SugarSync, Box.net, Flickr, Facebook, Evernote, Instagram, Picasa, Google Docs) are searched for the missing document, file, music, video or whatever you are searching over the cloud. Here, Google or some other search engine won`t help you in searching your personal data. So that where the ZeroPC2.0 universal search came into action. With ZeroPC2.0 universal search you can also search content over the web too.

ZeroPC2.0 brings the powerful content navigator – Navigating through couple of cloud storage services is another daunting task, but ZeroPC2.0 lets you connect all your cloud storage service accounts along with your social networking profiles to a single secure place from where you can control every service via a single login. It`s a kind of bird eye view to the cloud storage services and social network profiles. With the content navigator provided by ZeroPC2.0, you can track and analyze your data, storage space used by every service you are using. With ZeroPC2.0 content navigator in hand, you can import/export data from one cloud service to another by simply dragging/dropping. What could be easier than this? Not only you can import/export data from the cloud services, but you can also drag/drop your data from external storage or through your local disk.

ZeroPC2.0 Cloud Dashboard – Cloud Dashboard provides the bird eye of the services connected, along with the space used by each service. All the content is so well categorized, that a single glance is enough to get the idea of storage space used and other statistics with number of files in each category.

ZeroPC2.0 is secure – No matter what, security is the most important aspect. Without security no one`s going to use your service, but the content over ZeroPC2.0 is 100% secure and one can blindly trust their service, all your data plus sharing are secured using high level security just as used in banks to save money.

What Else Is New -

Cloud Backup – Cloud Backup is a service available only to the premium users aka “Pay As You Go” service which allows you to create one time or recurring backup and restore for your precious content. Now feel free and stay safe as all your data is safe which can be accessed or restored via a single login.

Web Browser Lite – A built-in web browser in ZeroPC web based cloud desktop which lets you enjoy web right through the ZeroPC desktop, without having to fire up another tab in your web browser.

File Explorer – With built-in File Explorer users can browse all their content stored in different cloud storage services along with the data uploaded over to the social media profiles through a single window. Want to share content from one to another? You can easily do that with just simply dragging/dropping from one service to another. With such an intuitive user-interface, it`s dead simple to use.

ZeroPC Cloud Navigator HD Android App – Now Android users can access all their cloud storage services right through their devices. With ZeroPC Cloud Navigator HD, you can connect, search and access your content in Dropbox, Google Docs, Facebook, Picasa, Flickr, Evernote, Box.net, Instagram and SugarSync. This Android App provides you plethora of features to stumble upon which are provided by ZeroPC. Can`t wait, download this Android app from Android Market(available free) and works on Android OS v3.0 and above. iPhone and iPad users, don`t feel jealous, as the ZeroPC application for your devices is in the pipeline.

ZeroPC is free to all which provides a whooping 15 GB of space(14 GB free cloud storage from connective services plus 1GB of additional storage space by ZeroPC ). Interested users can grab it by signing up, if liked, you can go for “Pay As You Go” service too, provided at a price of $1 per month. Sounds great? Here`s a bird eye view of the plan and pricing.

Take a video tour of the ZeroPC.

And to enjoy all those delicacies, you just need a web browser. ZeroPC runs flawlessly on all web browsers including Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer and supporting all Operating systems(Microsoft Windows, Apple – Mac, Android and iOS)

Monday, November 7

If you are looking for a quick way to send/save files to multiple cloud services right from the web browser, then there`s a extension for it. Instead of downloading the file to your local disk and then uploading it to the cloud storage service, you can now simply save the file to multiple cloud storage, thus saving a lot of internet bandwidth in downloading/uploading the files you are about to use.

Click Cloud Save from the right click menu, and choose the desired cloud storage service where you want to save the file.

Grant access to the service to save the file.

Tip - Make sure to access the file via the direct link.Mozilla Firefox users can enjoy this service using this Add-on - Drag2up.Now save files to your cloud storage services right from your web browser. Do you find this extension useful? Do share similar extensions you are using via comments.